Thump! Thump! Thump!
It felt like the ground was shaking.
The members of the Red Team looked down and saw a shield-wearing man running up the stairs towards them.
"It’s Tauro. They are attacking!"
Nathan shouted.
With shield in hand, Tauro smashed through the Earth Wall cast by Justin, and he then pulled out his longsword.
"Tank’s Taunt!"
It turned all of Red Team’s attention at him. They suddenly felt anger. It was something they couldn’t control.
Tank’s Taunt was basically mind control—manipulation of one’s emotions—it was extremely effective.
It worked especially well against those who had weak mental fortitude, and it immediately showed.
"Die!"
Nathan pulled out his arrows, pulled back on his bowstring, and released them all at once.
They smashed into Tauro’s shield with a loud clang. Nathan’s face was twisted into a look of pure hatred.
At that moment, Billie and Abdul ran past Tauro and attacked the Red Team’s frontlines, pushing Trevor and Lucy back.
"Mountain!"
Trevor turned into a rock-skinned behemoth. The blades couldn’t cut him.
"Basic Slash!"
Lucy brought her sword down, and Billie quickly shouted, "Basic Parry," and deflected the blow with her shield.
The two young women clashed. The swords ran out in the air. It was very even between the two of them.
"Flamethrower!"
In that moment, from behind Tauro, Kira’s voice shouted, "Flamethrower!" and a burst of flames shot out towards the Red Team.
"Water Cannon!"
Justin shouted, and a powerful stream of water emerged from his wand. It smashed into the flames. The battle between fire and water raged on.
’...It’s a close match so far.’
Fang Raon thought, and then he swung his hand and barked an order.
"Keep them out of the summit. As long as they are not at the top, they are not contesting the King of the Hill, and we’re slowly winning the match!"
Red Team shouted, "Roger!" and forcefully pushed the Blue Team’s members out of the summit.
They made a wall around the entrance to make sure that nobody could get in.
At the skies above the mountain, the camera was zooming in to capture every moment of the intense match.
...
With the chat interface open in front of her, Miranda was watching the match through binoculars.
She was at the watchtower.
The chat was moving slowly.
[Pain1112: Red Team is doing good!]
[OverDrive: That’s the Solo Clear guy? It’s pretty bold to put someone like him as Team Leader who made a name for himself for being a lone wolf!]
[TommyL: Yeah, no guild wants someone that works alone, but it looks like he is leading them pretty well!]
[Lumos: It’s not over yet. Blue Team has Machary, and I was able to see him do Mutual Combat over on the 5th floor a few weeks ago. That guy is a beast!]
Miranda checked the chat messages and also noticed that Machary was hiding somewhere.
She was pretty pleased that she managed to get Machary to join them, but it definitely wasn’t easy, as there were many good guilds out there that he could have joined instead.
Machary said, "I have my reason for joining Rose Records," to Miranda, but he didn’t elaborate further.
It made her really curious about that reason.
’...I said that the teams are balanced and fair, but they really aren’t, not against Machary. If I wanted to make them really fair, Machary’s team should only have three people and not seven.’
Miranda thought.
...
"Tank’s Taunt!"
Tauro again attracted all the anger towards him, and Nathan and Alexia pulled the strings of their bows and sent a barrage of arrows towards him.
He kept defending with his shield.
Nathan and Alexia were slowly wasting their arrows, but they had a fair share of arrows in their inventory still.
’Something is off... Machary is nowhere to be seen, and for some reason, Tauro keeps spamming that Tank’s Taunt as soon as his cooldown ends.
’He could be doing that to make our Rangers waste their arrows, or he is simply a noob who doesn’t know what he is doing.
’Or he wants to take our attention away.’
Fang Raon frowned, walked to the edge of the mountain, and couldn’t see anything, but he was still suspicious.
’Nathan and Alexia is also not in the right state of mind to use Keen Sense because of that stupid Tank’s Taunt skill.’
Fang Raon’s suspicion grew.
In that moment, he noticed that the camera wasn’t looking at the people fighting at the top of the summit.
It was showing the side of the mountain.
Fang Raon walked over, looked down, and came face-to-face with Machary, who had been climbing the side of the mountain all this time!
"?!"
Fang Raon swung his sword, but Machary shouted, "Super Jump," and front-flipped over Fang Raon’s attack.
He landed at the top of the mountain, and with his left hand, he pulled out his blade from the inventory.
"It’s Machary!"
Red Team shouted in fear, but they couldn’t do anything about him, as they had to focus on the rest of the Blue Team.
They had to leave Machary to Fang Raon!
"I love sword fighting, you see. It’s so thrilling, the way you can die just from a single mistake, and the adrenaline rush is like nothing else."
Machary said with a smile.
"Huff..."
Fang Raon hopped like a boxer, grabbed his sword and shield tight, and then lunged forward like an arrow released from a bow.
"Sword Stab!"
His arm extended, the tip of the silvery blade nearing Machary, but he just waved the sword and parried the attack easily.
"Basic Slash!"
Fang Raon whipped the sword in a swift horizontal motion. It was fast and swift, but Machary was faster.
Machary chopped his sword at the blade of the Refined Sword and smacked it aside like it was nothing.
"Great Chop!"
Machary lifted his sword high and chopped it down at Fang Raon. It came from his blind spot, right above his head.
"Dodge Roll!"
Fang Raon rolled out of the way.
With his muscles bulging, Machary stopped his sword swing before it smashed into the ground and extended the slash towards the direction where Fang Raon rolled off to.
Fang Raon stopped his roll and swung the sword back at Machary, but in that moment, the opponent’s sword came quicker.
Machary’s sword cut through Fang Raon’s left knee.
"...Ah."
Fang Raon lost the feeling in his left leg, and he tried to catch himself with that leg, as he didn’t notice it was gone.
Because of the sudden loss of balance, he collapsed to the ground.
[-1 HP]
[-1 HP]
[-1 HP]
"...He lost."
Nathan whispered.
It was absolutely destructive towards Red Team’s morale. It dropped their morale to the darkest pits.
The whole match was basically over with this 1v1 loss.
"...You are not level 1... Are you?"
Fang Raon asked, and he turned to lie on his back and saw Machary standing over him with a smile.
"I became level 2 yesterday. Lucky me, aye? I am no longer Warrior. I am a Level 2 Swordsman."
"...Well played."
Fang Raon whispered.
In that moment, Machary stabbed him in the face, and Fang Raon disappeared into pixels, and in front of every Red Team member, a notification came.
[Fang Raon has died!]